Sunday, June 2, 2013

week 34 | Happy Late Memorial day from Nogales!!!!!

Hola Familia!!!!

I am coming to ya a day late. No libraries were open yesterday so we couldn't email.

First of all you guys all look great. I loved all the pictures. I love our last minute Hughes family adventure vacations. It cracks me up that seriously all of our favorite vacations are the ones we plan the day before we go haha. It looks like a blast. I can't wait to go when we all get back! Congrats Grandpa Val! At least if you had to mess up your shoulder you did it WINNING a tournament. How epic.

I love you guys. There is nothing that defines our family more than Giants games and the Cali coast.

The work is moving forward here in Nogales. We have been crazy busy here. Everyday we have about 10 hours more of things we need to do than the actual time that we have. I have learned alot of things about prioritizing here on my mission.

I want to say one thing that my basketball skills have improved a ton. We play all the time on P day and I actually feel like a contributing member of a team now. :)

On tue. we had a cool experience. An inactive family in the branch here signed up to feed the missionaries, so the 5 Nogales Elders went over and tue and we had an awesome meal. The Lord truly prompted them to sign up to feed us this week. Of that I am sure. They were baptized a couple of years ago and have since fallen away from the church. They are truly struggling. They are facing many hard things and they had some very tough questions for us. I am so grateful for the spirit that helps us to always know what to say. Elder S and I taught the dinner message and it quickly turned very intense. This family wanted answers. We were able to direct them to the source of all answers our Savior. He has the power to bind up every broken heart. I love serving Inactive families. Many times they need to be rescued just as much as some of our investigators.

I ran for Heidi this week. I thought of her alot. I am REALLY out of shape. She would probably be laughing at me haha. I felt her with me and I am grateful for a way to remember her. I love this tradition.

I ate some amazing carne asada this week. I love the food here.

We had zone conference on thur this week. I love the chance to go and get spiritually recharged. President Killpack's final training to us was very powerful. I am so grateful for the spirit that can come in and truly teach us of the things that we need to know and feel. I felt that on Thursday. This gospel is a 'you can do this' gospel. It is full of hope. I love that about this restored church. Sometimes things are hard here, mostly because we want to help people progress and do all we can, and it feels like we hit dead ends. I am so grateful for the promptings of the spirit that tell me I CAN do this.

Later on Thur we helped a couple families move. It was one of those nights where we were all really tired (because we had to get up super early in the morning to go to zone conference) so naturally everything was also hilarius. The 5 of us Nogales Elders were crying we were all laughing so hard. I have no idea why. Missionary work is a blast.

2 Investigators I want to talk about this week.

One is C. She and her son we had an amazing lesson with. We were able to teach them clearly and the spirit was strong. C started saying 'I have never felt this way before' and 'this makes me want to act.' This was music to our ears. I have truly seen over and over again how the spirit is the true teacher. We are just the messengers of that spirit. We are excited for C.

R is another investigator that we have that we have had amazing experiences with this week. He is a true seeker of truth. He really want to know of the truth. Last night we had one of the most direct and powerful lessons that I have had as a missionary. He brought forward a bunch of beliefs that are different from our doctrines. Using the scriptures and thanks to the spirit after only 20 minutes and 10 scriptures he truly understood and agreed with all that we taught. He prayed to know last night to truly know if these things are true. We are going back today to follow up on his prayer. It is like Christmas morning for us to go back today. I prayed so hard for him last night.

The rest of this week we have continued to work with many people. We have faced many obstacles and we have had to push through many frustrations. I know that the Lord has blessed us. Many of the people we are teaching are SO close to progressing!! With faith we can do it.

I sang in church this week on Sunday! It went well. I sang my favorite 'I know that my redeemer lives' :) Once in english and another time in Spanish.

I love you guys so much. Thank you for your emails and love. You are all such wonderful examples to me.

LOVE

Elder Hughes

PS I can totally see you guys (mom and dad) serving as office missionaries for a mission one day. (just sayin)